Fun In The Hawthorne Household.

Whoot! All the little Hawthornes are home for Christmas along with their puppies so the Hawthorne Household is quite a busy little household.

Mr. Hawthorne and Beau

share an intimate moment on the couch.

Dixie, Beau, and Giada. All sitting for their treat.

Here are Beau and Giada happy to be on the couch.

These two are great pals and are so glad to be reunited again.

Cute puppies playing.

Enough of the puppies. Let's get back to the FOOD. Mr. Hawthorne wanted Eggs Benedict this morning, so of course I complied.

Spinach went into the pot to be steamed.

This is a wonderful ham Mr. Hawthorne cooked yesterday. It's a 7-pound Smithfield butt portion hardwood smoked ham. I made a delicious glaze for it: brown sugar fresh orange juice ground mustard cloves ginger allspice orange marmalade

I sauteed a few slices in butter.

And here's the steamed spinach.

Next, Hollandaise sauce. Two egg yolks and about 2 teaspoons lemon juice.

Gradually whisk in pats of butter. Whisk constantly over low heat. About 3/4 stick.

Now, for perfectly poached eggs, add a few tablespoons of white vinegar into the water.

Bring to a boil (Yes, cutting edge photography of boiling water.) and stir vigorously to create a vortex into which you crack the egg.

I cooked the egg for about 2 minutes and here's my perfectly formed poached egg.

I toasted an English Muffin (Yes, I know. I Semi-Ho'd it by using Thomas' English Muffins instead of making homemade English Muffins.), added the ham slices, the steamed spinach, and my poached egg.

Isn't this pretty?

And now for the Hollandaise. Crap. It curdled on me. Curdling may occur from overheating or adding the butter too quickly. If this happens to you, not to worry. There are ways to fix this. Beat another egg yolk in a pan and gradually whisk in the curdled Hollandaise. Or, place a tablespoon of water in a small bowl and beat in the separated sauce gradually until smooth. But, obviously, I didn't do anything about my botched Hollandaise. There are worse things than curdled Hollandaise, and really, it wasn't that curdled.

This is my favorite part - releasing the yolk. Our Eggs Benedict were delicious in spite of the Hollandaise.

And this is what it's like in the Hawthorne Household with three very large dogs.